By Mike Gerber
LONDON — San Diego is five and a half thousand miles from my home city London, but just a mouse click away in cyberspace – and that’s all it takes to listen in to my, Mike Gerber’s, Jazz Jews radio show.
The opportunity to front this new show, for the internet station UK Jazz Radio, has come about because of my book, Jazz Jews, published in the UK earlier this year. If you love jazz, you’ll love UK Jazz Radio as it features probably the widest range of jazz and related music anywhere on the planet.
And my Jazz Jews show adds to the mix, featuring Jewish jazz fusions, klezmer and other rootsy Jewish music, jazz standards based on music by the great Jewish-American songwriters, and Israeli jazz. Jews have figured large in the history of jazz, and blues too, both as musicians and facilitators, so my show also celebrates that contribution.
It can be heard at any time, anywhere in the world, via the
station’s Listen Again facility at: http://www.ukjazzradio.com/ListenAgain.html. The current show includes:
- Bill Charlap – one of my favourite contemporary pianists because of his delightfully fresh but reverential interpretations of Great American Songbook standards. The track I’ve selected is ‘America’ from his trio album Somewhere: The Songs of Leonard Bernstein.
- George Wein – the impresario behind the Newport Jazz Festival and many other major events, but also a jazz vocalist and pianist. Listeners can enjoy his rendition, with stellar collaborators, of ‘I’m Going To Sit Right Down and Write Myself a Letter’, a song composed by Jewish songwriter Fred Ahlert.
- Dave Frishberg – the vocalist/pianist celebrated for his droll songs that capture the mores of American life. But the track I play highlights his prowess as a solo instrumentalist on ‘You Took Advantage of Me’, a composition by the Jewish-American songwriting team of Richard Rodgers and lyricist Larry Hart.
- Aaron Weinstein – a young star of jazz violin, with ‘Dark Eyes’, a Russian Gypsy traditional tune much favored by both jazz and klezmer musicians.
- Hasidic New Wave – the radical Jewish jazz combo with ‘Waaw Waaw’ from their album From the Belly of Abraham, backed by Afro-Islamic percussionists Yakar Rhythms. Shades of Weather Report and fusion-era Miles here.
- Oz Noy – Israeli jazz-rock guitarist. ‘In The Jungle’, from his album Oz Live, recorded at The Bitter End club, NY, is by turns subtle and kicking.
- Dave Brubeck – the famous pianist isn’t Jewish. But in 1969 he composed The Gates of Justice, an extended contemporary work, with jazz elements, intended to help mend relations between Jews and blacks. On my show we hear the opening three tracks of a 2001 rerecording, featuring Jewish cantor Alberto Mizrahi, black baritone singer Kevin Deas, and Brubeck, with choir.
- Eugene Marlow’s Heritage Ensemble – as my latest show was initially broadcast just before the December festive season, I wind up with ‘Chanukah, Oh Chanukah’, a number from the ensemble’s album Celebration that renders Hebraic songbook tunes in jazz and Latino mode.
My Jazz Jews radio hour is just monthly at present. But if the show attracts sponsorship, as some of the station’s other shows have done, I hope to go out more regularly.
For more information about the show, and to contact me, see my presenter’s page at: www.ukjazzradio.com/MikeGerber.html.
For information about my book, Jazz Jews, see: www.jazzjews.com. Although it has not yet secured a US publishing/distribution deal, the book is on offer at a substantial discount, post free anywhere in the world, at: www.bookdepositry.co.uk/book/9780907123248/Jazz-Jews